Deadly News: A Thriller Page 3

  Abby’s Story, continued

  Her third would pass by unnoticed until much later.

  “Hey,” Ecks said, surprised. “Happy to see you too.”

  Abby pulled away. “Jesus, you have no idea.” Standing there with the door open made Abby nervous. She peeked out past him. “I guess no one followed you?”

  He raised his eyebrows, let out something like a laugh mixed with an exhalation. “I don’t think so. Should I be worried?” He looked down. “Is that a knife?”

  Abby pulled him inside and shut and locked the door. “I don’t know.” She shook her head. “This is crazy. I don’t— I don’t know what to think. Let me get my stuff and we can go.”

  Abby gathered her things, enough for a few days; though she didn’t know how suggesting staying at Ecks’s place would go over. He’d probably get the wrong idea. She’d worry about it when it came to that. For now, where the hell were her keys?

  She dropped the knife on the coffee table and got on hands and knees to look under the couch that Ecks now sat on. As she pushed his feet to the side, then up, to make sure nothing was under them, he asked, “You going to tell me now what happened? And why were you carrying a knife? Are you a killer? You shouldn’t leave those kind of things out of your résumé.”

  She looked up at him. Shook her head and sighed. “I was sleeping, I’d been up for so long yesterday that I just couldn’t even stand. I was so tired. So when I got back here, I just crashed on the couch, I was too exhausted to even change, and I must have been out pretty quickly. But I was so tired, that I think I forgot to lock the door—damn, I mean I might not have even shut it. So I pass out, and then hours later I wake up and I’m thirsty, so I go get some water. At this point, I’m only half awake and have every intention of going right back to sleep as soon as I finish my water. So I’m in the kitchen, and I see that the front door is open. I’m like, that’s odd. I go to shut it, and two more odd things happen.”

  Her keys weren’t on the floor or under the couch. She stood with a grunt. “Up.”

  Ecks stared at her. “How is ‘up’ odd?”

  “No. You, up. I need to check under the cushions. Thanks. So, anyway, I’m in the hall, and I hear the stairwell-door shut. A second or two later, I hear the elevator chime. I make it just in time— Ah! There.” She grabbed the key ring wedged under the cushion against the very back of the seat, almost completely lost into the nebulous nether region of never retrieval that was the inside of her Salvation Army sofa.

  She stared at the key ring in her hand, tilted her head.

  “What’s wrong? Missing something? A key?”

  “It’s not what’s missing.” She looked at him. “These aren’t my keys.”

  “What do you mean? Whose are they?”

  She shook her head, mouth open. “We need to get out of here.”

  “What? What’s wrong?”

  Her mouth was suddenly dry. “Ecks…” She licked her lips.

  “What?” he asked with mounting irritation.

  “I just remembered something. Something about summer, a few years back.” Saying this got her moving. She tossed the key ring in her empty purse and, avoiding the knife, swept the contents from off the coffee table and into it, heedless of the far too fragile glass of her phone’s screen or her laptop’s general wellbeing. “Remember a few years ago, the rape story?”

  “When you first started? I wasn’t there yet, remember?”

  “But you heard about it, yeah?” Abby closed the knife and shoved it into her pocket. She had pepper spray—or was it Mace?—somewhere, she thought. Another gift from her weapon-loving ex-boyfriend. Or maybe her mom, when she’d moved to the city. It was old, in any case, and she hadn’t seen it in ages, but she was pretty sure she still had it somewhere around here.

  She dashed into her bedroom, Ecks trailing her, and started trashing her closet.

  “Abby, calm down.”

  She ignored him. Where the hell was it? As she pulled down things she hadn’t looked at in years, she was filled with an irrational hope that she’d find a handgun from her ex; a parting gift, maybe. “So, the rape story?”

  “Yeah,” he said, exasperated, “everyone has.”

  “Well, in his email, he mentioned it. I didn’t really think about it, but it makes sense.”

  “He?”

  She stopped digging and turned to look at Ecks. “Soren. The guy who gave me the folder. Did you see him?”

  “No, Darla did. She gave it to me to give to you when I got in. Said it was dropped off not long before. Don’t know why she didn’t give it to you herself. I think she’s trying to set us up.”

  “You think she’s not who she says?”

  Ecks stares at her with a frown and mouth open. Then he shakes his head. “Jesus you’re paranoid. I mean on a date.”

  “Not likely,” Abby said. The look on Ecks’s face made her feel bad. He had come all the way over here on a moment’s notice. Yeah, but maybe he hoped he’d be giving her more than on type of ride.

  She went back to searching for the Mace. A box of old jewelry and trinkets fell to the floor, and, scattered among the bracelets and glass figurines, was a very tactical looking, very black, and very elating cylinder of burning liquid. “Yes!” She snatched the container from the floor, then shut the closet door. “Let’s go.” She grabbed him by the sleeve and dragged him out of her room, which was a mess, put on her coat, shouldered her purse newly heavied with the Mace, and headed for the door.

  “Oh shit.” She paused at the front door. “Please tell me you drove here.”

  “Of course, public transit couldn’t get me here that quick.”

  “Uber’s pretty quick. Where’s your car?”

  “Out front, in a loading zone.”

  “Pray it’s not towed.”

  “I’m Buddhist.”

  She stared at him, hand frozen on the lock, mid turn.

  He sighed. “A joke.”

  “Oh.”

  They exited.

  “Shit!” she said, punching her door as soon as she had shut it.

  “You’re gonna get an aneurysm.”

  “I locked the frigging door.”

  “So?” He looked blankly at her.

  She licked the corner of her lip, and looked back to the locked door, as though she might step back through time and undo what she just did.

  “Oh, your keys. Landlord?”

  Abby sighed. “I guess.” She tried the door handle one more time. “I’ll figure it out later. Come on.”

  In the hallway, he headed toward the elevator, but she diverted him to the stairs. Outside, the sun leaving the area for another day, his car was just where he’d left it, in a yellow zone, with a meter maid slapping a ticket onto the windshield.

  “Well, perfect timing,” he said.

  …

  “So, where to?”

  Abby finished buckling her seatbelt, then stared at Ecks.

  “Abbs?”

  She closed her eyes, then opened them. “Sorry. I don’t know. I just sort of realized there’s nothing I can do right now.”

  “You could go to the police.”

  “I guess. Damn—fingerprints, DNA.” She punched the dashboard.

  “Hey! Chill. They’ll take your fingerprints and DNA, that way they can separate it out.”

  “You were there too.”

  “I’ll give them mine. Has anyone else been there recently?”

  She looked at him. “Has anyone else been there? Yeah, every night I have a few guys come by, you know, just to relieve stress.”

  “You’re joking.”

  “Am I?”

  He started the car. “Okay, we’ll go to the police then, see what they say.”

  “Fine. I guess.”

  Since traffic was light that day, they arrived at the police station, five blocks away, only forty-five minutes later. Parking was more difficult.

  After ten minutes of circling the lot, waiting for someone to leave, Abby
couldn’t take it anymore and said, “Just park there. It won’t take that long.”

  “You want me to park in a loading zone again? I’m not a collector.”

  “You’re not a coll— Oh. Ha. So funny.”

  “It wouldn’t be if you were the one paying for it.”

  They looped around the tiny lot again.

  “Oh come on, just park there.”

  “Frick.” He parked in the loading zone, which was conveniently close to the entrance.

  As they were getting out, a large women came out of the door to the station. “You’re not planning on parking there, are you?” she said, glowering at the two of them.

  “No,” Abby said seriously.

  “Good. Because both of you getting out, and the car off, makes it look that way.”

  “We’re just trying to be green,” Abby said.

  The woman cast her gaze against Ecks.

  “I’m just helping out. My mother always taught me to help a woman in need.”

  “Well,” the woman huffed. “Maybe there’s a scrap of chivalry left.” She huffed again. “Carry on.”

  “My mother taught me to help women in need?” Abby asked inside the station.

  “It worked, didn’t it?”

  “I don’t think she was a cop, so not much danger of her doing anything anyway.”

  “She could have—”

  “Can I help you?” an obscenely bubbly teenager asked from behind the counter, popping out of nowhere.

  Abby peered through the window and saw the teen must have come from that door there, to the left. “Hi. I hope so. I’d like to report a break-in.”

  The teen kept smiling. “To your car?”

  “No, I don’t have a car, actually. Um, to my apartment.”

  “Why didn’t you call us? That’s not safe you know, waiting like that.”

  Abby looked at Ecks, as if for that promised assistance.

  He wasn’t paying attention to her.

  “Yeah, you’re probably right. I was just, I don’t know. But, can you do something?”

  “Sure. What would you like me to do?”

  Abby stifled a sigh. “I guess take a report? Dust the place for fingerprints?”

  “Oh,” the teen laughed. “This isn’t television. We don’t do that kind of thing in real life.”

  Abby stared blankly, deadpanned: “You don’t dust for fingerprints? Or don’t take reports?”

  The teen stared, smiling. “Just go ahead and fill out that form, right there—no, the other one, yeah—just sit down over there and fill out the form, and I’ll get one of the cops out here—officers, I’ll get one of them out here to take a statement. And then we can go from there.” With that, she disappeared through the door she’d entered through.

  Abby took the sheet and sat down in one of the cloth covered plastic chairs lining the station’s front window.

  Ecks sat down next to her, and their arms touched due to the chairs’ proximity to one another. God, she thought, trying to concentrate on the form, what was this, high school?

  Maybe a half hour after finishing filling out the form, an officer came in through the front door. He scanned the station, spotted Abby and Ecks. “Abby, I presume?”

  Abby stood, and shook the officer’s outstretched hand. “Hi.”

  “Hello. I’m Officer Delano.” He gestured at his nametag. “I’m told there was a robbery?”

  “I don’t know if anything was stolen. Maybe a reverse robbery.”

  He gave her a questioning look.

  “Fingerprints?”

  He looked blank for a moment more, then smiled. “Ah, I get it. Clever. We can certainly hope so. Would you like to sit down, or maybe get some fresh air while you tell me what happened?”

  Abby looked around. “Fresh air I guess would be nice.”

  “Great.” He held open the door for her and Ecks, and a minute later Abby found herself leaning against the hood of his car, telling him what had happened. She felt an odd reluctance, perhaps from too much news about corrupt officials and conspiracies and the government’s inherent incompetence—which in sufficient quantity was indistinguishable from malice, Becky was fond of quoting—to tell him everything, and kept catching herself leaving things out.

  “Hmm,” he said when she’d finished. “That is odd. Nothing stolen and no attack of any kind. And, uh”—he looked at his pad—“Ecks here wasn’t there, correct?”

  “Yes. He just gave me a ride here.”

  The cop smiled, his eyes remaining unaffected by the movement. “Of course. Okay, let me see what I can do. In the meantime, I’d suggest staying away. Do you have somewhere you can stay?”

  “I can figure something out.”

  “All right then.” He looked at his watch. “My shift’s just about ending, so I’ll file the report once I get back. The number you gave me is your cellphone, correct?”

  Abby nodded.

  He held out his hand. “Nice to meet you, Ms Melcer. I’ll let you know what’s going on as soon as I do.” He gave a quick salute to Ecks, then got in his patrol car and backed out of the lot, before entering the street and accelerating quickly to avoid a collision with oncoming traffic.

  “Why does everyone think I’m in the military?”

  “I don’t think that’s what he meant.”

  “What now?”

  “I don’t know. You hungry?”

  “Why Abbs, are you asking me out?”

  “No. I’m hungry, I was just being nice and asking instead of saying, ‘Ecks, I’m hungry, feed me.’”

  “I’d feed you. What do you feel like?”

  They got in Ecks’s car. He started it, then they sat there.

  “Are we gonna go?”

  “Once you tell me where.”

  “Anywhere, can’t you decide?”

  “I’m not the one who’s hungry. But fine, we’re going to Vince’s.”

  Abby shook her head. “No, I don’t want Italian. Let’s get Chinese somewhere.”

  “Too bad. You forfeited, and I’m driving. We’re going to Vince’s.” He laughed. “I’m kind of hungry now.”

  They left the lot, and headed in the opposite direction from that which Officer Delano had gone. They didn’t notice the person on a nearby roof taking photos of them. Abby would later see one of those photos, in which she was facing directly toward the camera, and in which she was completely unaware.

  While they ate, Abby brought up a hotel. Ecks offered to drive her there, and she sighed. After taking a slightly more direct route—“I wish I didn’t have to spend the money”—Ecks caught on and offered his place.

  They got there around ten o’clock that night, and the first thing Abby did was go around and lock all the windows.

  “We’re on the thirteenth floor, I don’t think anyone’s coming in that way.”

  “You never know. Wait, I thought this was the fourteenth floor?”

  “It is technically. Or, non-technically? Anyway, you know how some buildings don’t have a thirteenth floor?”

  “So we are on the fourteenth then.”

  “Well no, because if you go outside and count, that window which you actually just unlocked would be the thirteenth from the ground.”

  “Shit. Why are your locks so weird? And why do your windows even open this high up?”

  He walked over and locked it for her. “I have no idea. Want to see something else weird about this place?”

  He brought her into his bedroom, and headed toward the bed.

  “Hey now,” she said.

  At the side of the bed, he pulled aside a door that blended in with the molding.

  “Whoa. That is cool. Closet?”

  “Come see.”

  It wasn’t a closest. Or maybe a stairs closet, if so. Inside was a winding spiral staircase that led up to a little loft area, which overlooked the main room of the apartment.

  “How did I not notice this?”

  Ecks pointed up toward the ceiling. “It’s t
he lights, and slope of the ceiling. Also the paint has something to do with it. Once you know it’s here, it’s easy to spot.”

  “This is pretty sweet,” Abby said, turning and scanning the little office. There was a short desk in one corner, with a laptop identical to her own atop it, a padded wooden chair with a purple cushion, a low sofa, and a flat screen hanging on the opposite wall. “This where you write all your Pulitzer candidates?”

  “Joke now, one day you’ll be begging me for an interview.”

  “I bet.” She sat in the chair and opened his laptop.

  “Hey!”

  She lifted her hands away from it, tongue on her back teeth, half grinning. “Wow, Ecks, you should calm down.”

  “God, girls are nosey.”

  “Lots of girls come here, do they?”

  He sat down on the sofa, taking his laptop with him. The cord didn’t reach that far, and came unplugged and dropped to the floor as he sat. “Not up here.”

  She stared at him. “I’m the first?”

  He didn’t look at her as he answered. “I’m sure lots of people have been up here. But since I moved in, it’s only been me.” He shrugged a single shoulder. “It felt like a secret. I didn’t want to share it with just anyone, because that would ruin it, make it not special.”

  She got up and sat down on the sofa next to him. It was small enough that they were very close. I’m not drunk enough for this, she thought.

  The next morning—

  “Whoa! Hold on,” the thirteen-year-old says. “Back up sister. We want to know what happened.”

  Abby looks shocked, you think. As though she hadn’t given this much thought. “What do you mean? Nothing happened. We slept and then got up the next morning.”

  “See? You’re doing it again. It’s the in-between we want to know about.”

  “You want to hear my dreams?”

  “I want to hear your feels!”

  “What?”

  “Oh, let her have her secrets,” the doctor’s wife says.

  “Yeah,” the woman who broke the champagne bottle’s fall agrees. “There are too many men here to share true feels.”